Faced with the ever-increasing costs of maintaining our giant wealth-siphoning government, faced with enormous public debt and the increasing costs of servicing it, and faced with shrinking revenue from a depressed and debt-burdened economy, our provincial government has little choice but to rein in public spending.

It is impossible to predict the outcome of the election, but the polls do favour a Liberal minority government. Should Justin Trudeau falter, the anti-Tory vote could go to the NDP, resulting in an NDP minority, a scenario even more favourable to electoral reform.

This shift in funding is a source of great concern for many community organizations. These organizations, which often work on the front lines with homeless men and women, foresee the disappearance of existing programs and services due to changing eligibility requirements.

Jean Tremblay has been in power since 1997 and is best known for having asked the Supreme Court to authorize him to pray at the beginning of every town council meeting. He’s generated so much media attention in his career that his occasional blunders are now met with laughter and the occasional “Aw shucks, he’s at it again.”

While teaching and research are fundamental to future prosperity, universities are also civic actors in their own right. They are "cities within cities," where the principles of pluralism create communities of diversity, open to the world.

There is the muzzling and firing of scientists and researchers — even librarians — seen as threatening, Harper’s clamps on public statements by Conservative MPs, the delays and refusals in response to Access to Information requests, and the systematic refusal to interact in a normal way with news media, a central institution in a free and democratic society.